Three nihilist life lessons I learnt from Hello Kitty

Hello Kitty. Famous for no discernible reason, and criminally useless. The Kardashian of cartoon characters.

It started as a practical joke that quickly got out of hand, but I am now at the stage of wearing Hello Kitty For Men shirts I bought for a lot of money in a pop-up store in Tokyo.

So, clearly, I have given this some thought.

It’s not that I hate Hello Kitty, although I do think she’s awful. I am drawn to Hello Kitty the same way people are to sour milk: it repels you, but you have to smell it. Because when I look beyond the bovine eyes and the non-mouth and that stupid say-nothing do-nothing expression, I see something of myself there.

Specifically three soul-crushing somethings.

Specifically these.

One: If you keep your mouth shut and your expression blank, nobody will know how empty you are inside and they will like you more.

Oooh Hello Kitty is so cute, mommy, can i have the [sippy cup / rucksack / pillow case/ chainsaw] with Hello Kitty on it?

And mommy says yes because there’s not much to object to– just a cat-like outline, not even the hint of a smile. Girlfriend ain’t even got a mouth.

That dead, inscrutable facade is the true mark of a sociopath. But mommy doesn’t know.

The truth is, it is easy to be disliked and judged negatively for expressing any form of thought or opinion — be it about politics, music or mayonnaise, someone’s bound to think you’re a dick. The path to popularity is to talk as much as you want while saying nothing at all.

Caption your next social media post with #livelaughlove (or is it #lovelivelife?) for likes and hearts. Try #blacklivesmatter for crickets and death threats. If you can successfully portray harmless banality in all your interactions, you can coast along quite well.

Life is easier if you pretend you’re an idiot. Mommy may not know that (she doesn’t have to pretend to be an idiot). But the Kitty knows.

Two: You might as well wear the same outfit all the time because no one ever notices.

Describe Hello Kitty’s outfit right now without Googling. Is it a pink dress thing? Is it a shirt and pants combo? Is she ass-naked and showing her no-no parts on that bib you bought for your niece that says I Heart My Gay Uncle?

You don’t know. Or you think you know, but you’re really not sure. Even though you have seen Hello Kitty a bazillion times. That’s because nobody truly pays attention to anything, but most particularly nobody truly pays attention to you.

Not to the new haircut you researched painstakingly before getting. Not to the $175 Carolina Herrera shirt you wore to your birthday dinner. Not to the botox.

All that money you’ve ever spent on clothes, hair products, gym — it’s all been a waste.

And it will always be a waste.

Three: The basis of your human nature is nothing but a collective agreement that is now crumbling to dust before your very eyes.

Back in 2014, the creators of Hello Kitty caused international headlines by claiming that Hello Kitty was, in fact, not a cat. She was a girl. Forget the cat ears and the cat whiskers and the KITTY IN HELLO FUCKING KITTY — the Sanrio company wants to gaslight you into believing that cat has always been a person and I guess we’re all idiots for ever thinking otherwise.

Hello Kitty is attempting to Rachel Dolezal her way into membership into the human condition, by simply declaring herself to be a human. And if Hello Kitty can be a person, what the hell does that make you?

A carbon-based life form. That’s all.

Hello Kitty is not the nihilist anti-hero we want. But she’s sure as fuck the one we deserve.

12 thoughts on “Three nihilist life lessons I learnt from Hello Kitty”

Completely vapid cartoon. It’s as meaningless and mindless as “reality TV,” or “alternate facts.” Our intellect is daily assaulted by oxymorons: intelligent design behind a chaotic universe, pain felt by the brain-dead, fetuses with legal standing, unborn child, and “Love the sinner, but hate the sin.” I got helium-filled, mylar balloons at a party last week. They had smiley faces and rainbows, and were destined to strangle somekind of wildlife. I snipped the valves, huffed the helium, and died laughing a high-pitched falsetto.